Diverse Configurations of Erroneous Predictive Coding Across Brain Hierarchies in a Non-Human Primate Model of Autism Spectrum Disorder

Abstract

In autism spectrum disorder (ASD), atypical sensory experiences are often associated with irregularities in predictive coding, which proposes that the brain creates hierarchical sensory models via a bidirectional process of predictions and prediction errors. However, it remains unclear how these irregularities manifest across different functional hierarchies in the brain. To address this, we used high-density electrocorticography (ECoG) in a non-human primate model of ASD during an auditory task with two layers of temporal control, and applied a quantitative model to quantify the integrity of predictive coding across two distinct hierarchies. Our results demonstrate that ASD is characterized by sensory hypersensitivity and unstable predictions across two brain hierarchies, and reveal the associated spatio-spectro-temporal neural signatures. Importantly, we observe diverse configurations of underestimation or overestimation of sensory regularities within these hierarchies. This work provides a multi-layered biomarker for ASD, contributing to our understanding of its diverse symptoms.